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I’ve always thought this was a cool little trick that got me thinking about macro photography in new ways. Don’t have a real macro lens but want to get really close? Grab a lens in the 100mm range and also your 50mm standard lens and stack them together for a 1:1 magnification. Or try different lens combinations to get in even closer. In the video I hold the two lenses together but you can also purchase a reversing ring to screw them together.

If you started with prophotolife at the very beginning you might remember that one of the specific reasons I started this blog was to help young photo assistants / aspiring photographers. Some of the earliest entries here were on the subject of starting out as a photo assistant. Tonight I’ve compiled nine of those assisting entries into a downloadable PDF called the Handguide for Beginning Photo Assistants. It’s basic but potentially helpful information for aspiring commercial photo assistants, especially in a market like here in the midwestern U.S.
I highly recommend …

link to gallery of 19 uncropped images from the shoot

Sometimes things are pulled together at the relatively last minute, like this shoot for the Educational Theatre Association. A shoot like this could take weeks of planning, propping and styling, but in this case it was a week long scramble to prep and was shot over a holiday weekend. Pulling something ambitious like this off in a short amount of time requires a talented cast. In this case the acting cast of 17 characters was just one person, comedian and …

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Since starting prophotolife.com I’ve been paying extra attention to questions visitors ask when in the studio. There are a surprising number of inquiries about the big (at least) 100 pound camera stands we use. The stands certainly never leave the studio but we use them on an almost daily basis so I thought it was time to give them a look in a video.
I’ve also noticed that clients seem to marvel at the ways we end up twisted in a corner on location, with our tripods splayed …

When was the last time you viewed photography you would describe as “arresting”? I don’t often use that term but that’s exactly how I feel about Andy Ilachinski’s Micro Worlds Portfolio. Andy is the author of the Tao of Digital Photography Blog and writes eloquently on the quest of the artist. If you’re seeking a higher level of understanding of your art and yourself, there’s inspiration to be found on Andy’s Blog.
I’ve been carrying my point-n-shoot around lately and snapped the shot at left while walking to lunch a couple …

Can a photographer find happiness switching from Apple’s Mac OS X to Windows Vista? This photographer is going to find out in a controlled experiment. Yes, at Daylight Photo we still have our eight Mac machines up and running and that’s not going to change, at least not in the short term. But when it came time to buy a laptop from which to run this blog, I decided to give a PC a try. I do have an aging PC desktop at home that runs Ubuntu Linux but my …

Where do you find inspiration?
Photographers often find inspiration by studying the work of other photographers. I certainly do. For both professionals and amateurs there are amazing resources like the contest sections at PDNonline. With something like 3 million photos uploaded to Flickr every day there’s certainly no lack of photographic diversity and inspiration there. The internet is an incredible resource for finding images and technical information. Looking at photographs isn’t the only way to find inspiration, though.
I began photo assisting straight out of high school and, as a result, never …

Do you buy used photo and camera gear on eBay?
With talk of starting a new photo project in August (some great suggestions in Friday’s comments) I’ve been thinking about what equipment to use for the project. For myself, I’m thinking film…35mm, 120 or 4″x5″? Hmmm, is there some new (used) camera that would totally spark my imagination? Camera hunting is a great excuse to start searching eBay.
Most of my camera equipment gets used on a fairly regular basis, I’m not that much of a collector. Yes, there are some odds …

Ever have a chance to photograph a car in a studio? At Daylight Photo we’re not completely set up for car photography but we had a chance to do this fun shoot, thanks to the Ohio Valley Camera Club, who rounded up the vintage Chevrolet. Though the auto doesn’t fit on a tabletop, we’re using the same principles as in earlier prophotolife product lighting videos (think of this as a really large cheese grater – with horsepower).

Here’s a link to the gallery of stills.
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Definitive copyright info
I just watched a couple of very informative videos on Photoshop Insider: Scott Kelby’s exclusive interview with Attorney Ed Greenberg on copyright, model releases and shooting in public. Many of the questions posed by prophotolife readers regarding legal issues (can I photograph that building? do I need a model release? how do I protect copyright?) are answered here in Scott’s videos, all in easy to understand language. Mr. Greenberg starts with a funny (and very accurate) statement, “photographers insist, when they have a legal problem, on asking other …